Thanks Zithal for an excellent tournament!
Honestly I can't remember ever having such a good time at a tournament, and we had some very good times at the Greek Club.
I especially liked the chance to put faces to names with all the players I'd "met" before on this forum. What a wild bunch you/we all are!
Here are the few most memorable moments of play for me...
* Very early in the satellite I dealt the hand on which Shoobs busted out. The action went preflop:
Shnoobs raises 3BB UTG, Hork reraises, some folding, Sloth
pushes all-in, covering both; Shnoobs calls, Hork calls.
Open: Shoobs AA, Hork AJ, Sloth JJ.
(My jaw dropped! Hork: that is not a good call.
)
Flop: Q-8-x
Turn: 10
River: 9
SICK! SICK! SICK!
Shnoobs: Sorry! I didn't do it on purpose!
* I got shortstacked in the satellite and just tried to hang on and coast into 4th, since 4th=1st was a buy-in to the main.
So I played tight ABC and it worked -- I made it to the final table with the third smallest stack among 7. Sloth, ScottyZ, and Iron were huge, Princess had double my stack, Chugs and
Mrs. Holem had a bit less than me. I can't remember the hand but I first took out Mrs. Holdem. The big stacks weren't fighting much as their incentive was gone, with the flat payout. Next, Chugs was in the BB and it was folded to me in the SB. I raised to 4BB, Chugs thought, then folded -- so I flashed the 92o I was holding. Chugs went "Hey!" under his breath and I knew that I had set up a play for later. Luckily enough the very next time I was in the SB it was folded to me and I was holding AA! I raised to 3BB and Chugs pushed all-in with his 99. No help came and I now outchipped Princess. I think it was Sloth who eliminated Princess and that was that.
* My firt big hand in the main was with Esool, sitting just to my right. He was the first into the pot with a minimum raise,
and I held KhQh. I decided to flat-call, fold to a re-raise,
and slam any flop without an A. We took the flop heads-up:
J-8-4. Esool bet out 100 -- decent for the pot size -- and
I raised to 400. He thought for a good while and grudgingly called. The turn was an A -- check, check. The river was a
brick -- check, check. He showed J7 (suited?) and I mucked.
I played this hand like shit. This cut my stack in half.
* My next big hand was also with Esool, and he outplayed me again. He limped in UTG and I raised to 3BB with QQ, about
40% of my stack. Folded back to Esool who quickly pushes
all-in right away. I misread this as an overbet -- really he
was only raising me the ~500 in *my* stack, as he had more than
double me. Well my chips went in.
Open:
Him: AhAx -- Me: QQ
Him: "OH YEAH!" -- Me: "OH SHIT!"
Flop: QhXhYh
Him: "OH SHIT!" -- Me: "OH YEAH!"
Turn: 4h
Him: "OH YEAH!" -- Me: "OH SHIT!"
River: 4x
Him: "OH SHIT!!!" -- Me: "OH YEAH!!!"
It was the biggest rollercoaster of the night and PROVED that it is better to be lucky than to be good.
Ten or fifteen minutes after this hand I busted Esool out in a hand I can't really remember.
* The next memorable thing affected me but I had to stay as uninvolved as possible. ScottyZ went on the most disgusting hot streak that it has ever been my displeasure to see not happening to me. And he was directly to my left! I could not get into a pot because he would always raise. I tend to respect a raise from ScottyZ, but after a while even he was amazed -- he showed AA twice, KK twice, QQ twice, all inside of 20 minutes! Needless to say, I was appalled.
* Finally, the hand in which Dick Hertz busted me out. It was
folded to me on the button and I raised to 3BB with JJ. The SB
folded and Dick pushed all-in on the BB, covering me. I called instantly showing JJ and he shows AQ -- a classic coin flip.
No help on the flop, no help on the turn, but a hideous Ace on the river. IGHN. You have to win some of these coin flips to win a tournament, and I think we both played this hand fine.
Congratulations to all the money- (and swag-) winners!
Zithal, thanks for a great event!
See you all at the next one!
